In the past, methods for estimating such motion vectors have been so expensive that it was only cost-effective to perform motion-estimation and/or motion-compensation (ME/MC) in high-end video processors. However, recent advances in technology and reductions in cost have changed this situation, and ME/MC algorithms have become cost-effective in many consumer-level devices. ME/MC is currently being developed for, if not actively used in, current generation televisions, set-top boxes, DVD-players, and various other devices, to perform, for example, temporal filtering, de-interlacing, frame rate conversions, cross chroma reduction.
Accordingly, in many video processing applications, it may be useful to have knowledge of the motion that occurs from picture to picture. Video processing methods generally strive to accurately model motion between pictures for use with compression algorithms. One method is to double a display rate of a video sequence by repeating every picture twice. However, such picture repetition may result in motion judder or judder. Accordingly, various video processing standards, such as, for example, MPEG1 and MPEG2, may compress video using more sophisticated methods to estimate motion between pictures. Decoding such compressed video data may result in pictures, which may have other artifacts.
Further limitations and disadvantages of conventional and traditional approaches will become apparent to one of skill in the art, through comparison of such systems with some aspects of the present invention as set forth in the remainder of the present application with reference to the drawings.